Although autonomously moving robot acting according to various purposes has been conventionally known, it is generally planned that the conventional robot moves as designated according to the designation due to a person (designator).
However, even if the robot does move as designated, the movement of the robot is often difficult in fact. For example, since the designator is a person, what is thought to be designated may not correspond to the content actually uttered and designated by error. In such a case, when an obstacle or the like is located at the location designated, the movement of the robot is obstructed by the obstacle.
Even if the designator utters what the designator thinks, there may be a level difference beyond the capability in which the robot can move. In this case, similarly, the robot is disturbed by the level difference and cannot move. When a person usually designates, the person does not always specify a material minutely, and may designate using a reference term such as “that” and “this”. In this case, the robot which cannot precisely recognize the designation becomes the cause of malfunction. Even when the robot recognizes the designation, the movement of the robot may fail by the error of the designation due to the designator and the unsuitable designation, and the robot may not be able to move suitably by collision or the like with an obstruction. When the robot cannot move correctly if there are no frequent and fine movement designations such as “move x meters to the left, and y meters to the front” from the designator, the load of the designator is large and the robot is unsuitable for bilateral work of the person and the robot.
Examples of techniques relevant to the movement of a robot include the following.
For example, an orbital forming method for realizing evasive behavior at the time of movement with a short time and an easy algorithm is disclosed in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application H5-11843. According to the orbital forming method, when the schedule orbit of the robot intersects with an obstacle range expressed by a line segment, the robot avoids the orbit, recalculates an orbit for avoiding the obstacle by the shortest distance, and moves while avoiding the obstacle.
However, when the method recalculates the orbit for avoiding the obstacle, the method calculates so that the robot passes along the side of the obstacle, and the method does not take a margin according to operation or the like of the robot into consideration. Therefore, when the robot moves on the scheduled orbital, the robot may interfere with an obstacle depending on the operation of the robot.
A robot control device for preventing the robot from moving out of an area where the robot should move is disclosed in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application H6-63883. In particular, the robot control device reads a data depot previously buried under the boundary part of the movement area, and thereby the movement of the robot to the outside of a movement allowable area is prevented. However, in the robot control device, it is necessary to previously bury the data depot under the boundary part of the movement area, and the robot may move to an area where the robot should not move at a location under which a data depot is not buried.
An information processor of a robot responding according to the reference term due to the designator is disclosed in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application 2001-188551.
However, the information processor of the robot only selects a suitable reference term, and does not decide whether the robot can arrive at the location shown by the reference term. Therefore, when the robot moves to the location designated, the robot may collide with an obstacle.
The present invention has been accomplished in view of the above problems.